


there's a hole in my soul

by oceanofchaos



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Hurt/Comfort, Loss, Pre Season 4, dealing with Allison's death
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-06-23
Updated: 2014-06-23
Packaged: 2018-02-05 23:33:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,704
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1836238
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oceanofchaos/pseuds/oceanofchaos
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>Lydia can’t breathe, she can’t breathe she </i>can’t–<i></i></p>
<p> </p>
<p>  <i>If she breathes it means she has to stop screaming and if she stops screaming then Allison is gone and she’s still here with Lydia in this moment and it hurts oh god Lydia can feel how much it hurts but she’d rather have that hurt forever than lose Allison for even a second and–</i></p>
<p> </p>
<p><i>She gasps for air. </i>That was my last scream,<i> she thinks. It seems fitting, if Allison’s swan song is her final scream. </i></p>
<p>---</p>
<p>Lydia loses part of herself when she loses Allison, they all do. She takes the time to mourn her best friend, takes time to recover from the loss. To grieve.</p>
            </blockquote>





	there's a hole in my soul

**Author's Note:**

> It didn't seem fair that they just ignored the aftermath, that we had to keep rattling onwards, that no one got the time to catch their breath, to recover. This fic is my way of dealing with Allison's death, and with how it must have torn Lydia apart. 
> 
> Title from that one Bastille song, you know the one.
> 
> Also Daphne Martin belongs to [verity](http://www.ladyofthelog.tumblr.com), who was nice enough to say I could borrow her.

 

Lydia can’t breathe, she can’t breathe she _can’t–_  

If she breathes it means she has to stop screaming and if she stops screaming then Allison is _gone_ and she’s still here with Lydia in this moment and it hurts oh god Lydia can feel how much it hurts but she’d rather have that hurt forever than lose Allison for even a second and–  

She gasps for air. _That was my last scream_ , she thinks. It seems fitting, if Allison’s swan song is her final scream. 

Stiles is holding her up, she’d sagged backwards the second she stopped for air, and he’s obviously confused, and she can’t explain. She needs to see, she needs to.

 

\---

 

They stop at the doorway, and look out at the tableau in front of them: Scott, cradling a limp Allison, hands soaked in her blood; Isaac, face twisted in helpless rage and desperation, claws deep in his own palms; Kira, katana half-raised, a witness of the grief around her, but more an outsider than a participant; on the edge stands Chris, silent and unmoving. 

“No,” says Stiles from behind her, voice hollow and sick sounding, “no no nono _no.”_

Lydia sways.

Lydia snaps.

She’s on the floor beside Scott in seconds, fingers searching desperately for a pulse she knows isn’t there. She laces her fingers into Allison’s, thinks _I wanna hold your hand_ , and realises that she’s keening. A thin, high noise, wavering and thready. It sounds broken. She feels broken.  

Scott looks up at her, eyes wild and glossy with tears. He adds his howl to hers, and the pack around them joins in. Distantly other howls join in. Derek, probably, and the twins, maybe.

 

\---

 

Kira takes Stiles home, and Chris prepares their stories for the police. Isaac’s not started crying yet. Lydia’s not stopped. 

“The police will only be a few more minutes,” says Mr. Argent, “and remember–”

“It happened so fast,” they chorus dutifully. Like parrots, like puppets. 

Lydia takes a shuddering breath, wipes the mascara from under her eyes, and numbs herself from it all. Scott reaches for her hand. She holds it, wedges herself between him and Isaac, blinks any remaining tears away.

 

\---

 

She doesn’t scream when Aiden dies, although she does sense it. Maybe she really won’t scream again. Maybe she’s lost it. She’s not very put out by the idea, for all a banshee is useless without their scream. Lydia Martin can offer more than mere supernatural abilities. 

She runs outside to see him anyway, knows she’s too late. Always too late.  

All she ever does is find the bodies. 

Stiles wraps her into a hug, mutters soothing little noises in her ears. Is Lydia’s throat tight from tears or from an unreleased scream?

 

\---

 

When it’s over, properly over, Lydia leans against the school lockers and just takes a minute. Takes a minute, readjusts her worldview. The air is kind of ashy, and she knows the nogitsune is gone, but the idea of having it even near her? She’ll take a shower tonight, she decides. Maybe two. 

Scott and Stiles are hugging it out now, and Isaac’s purely and blatantly relieved, and Lydia looks at them and thinks, _Allison, oh god_. 

And thinks, _What now?_

 

\---

 

She goes home alone. 

Derek’s the one to drop her off, says it’s on his way to the loft, he’s going back anyway. She doesn’t really care that much, just. She’ll need to learn how to drive. She’s never learnt, never had any need; there was Allison, and Jackson before her. Summer was kind of frustrating, but she knew it was temporary, and now? Now. 

The house is empty. The house is a mausoleum. She’s standing in a graveyard again.

She’s _always_ standing in a graveyard.

There’s a note on the fridge, a reminder from her mother that it’s a parents’ evening at the school. Prada’s been at Deaton’s for a few nights now, partly due to a cold, partly for protection from the nogitsune. Like he would have bothered. It’s so different in hindsight, isn’t it? 

She can’t be bothered to cook much, hates being in the kitchen anyway, so she chucks a pizza in the oven and goes to sit on the living room sofa. She wishes Prada was home, she sort of really wants to cuddle him. She hugs a pillow tightly to her chest instead. Tries to breathe. 

_Death doesn't happen to you,_ she hears Stiles say again, _It happens to everyone around you, okay? To all the people left standing at your funeral trying to figure out how they're gonna live the rest of their lives without you in it._  

She’s crying.

Lydia’s lost people before. Lost her parents to arguments at eight years old, her big sister to apathy not long after. Her relationships with her parents are still fractured, might never heal fully. Her dad always provoking the worst out of her, her mom always expecting the least of her. Daphne got out of town when Lydia was just a kid, sped off to Juilliard while Lydia was left reeling in the aftermath of her parents’ divorce. Lost Jackson to his ego, to a curse, to London. They don’t really talk anymore, can’t really bare to, but are still friends on Facebook. Sometimes it feels like a worse form of distance, able to watch their life but unwilling to interact with it, to admit to even that slight voyeurism. Allison used to laugh at her, say she was overthinking it, say she should just message him, _god_ , you’re _Lydia Martin_ , you can facebook message a guy, okay? 

This is different, this loss. Stiles was right, and she never really appreciated how much. Never got it. Always had put it down to panic and melodramatics, but death _doesn’t_ happen to you. He was so right. _Fuck_. 

Allison’s not coming back, is the thing. With her sister, with her parents, with Jackson, it could all be fixed. It would take time and effort, which she’s not sure they deserve, but she could do it. She could get them all back. Allison… She’s never felt a loss so permanent before, never lost a close friend.

Never had a close friend.

She’ll let herself have this, have tonight. Let herself have a night of sobbing, of wallowing, of grieving. Tomorrow she’ll have to start rebuilding the walls Allison had broken down. 

The pizza’s ready. 

 

\---

 

Allison’s favourite movie is _Ten Things I Hate About You_ , if you ask her in public. It’s an even split of _Mulan_ and _Dodgeball_ once you actually got to know her. Was. Fuck.

Lydia doesn’t want silence right now. She doesn’t. She can’t. She. 

She goes to her room, it’s too dark, too big and open and gaping downstairs. Too exposed. Big open windows, and Peter Hale’s ghost whispering at her nape, and no Allison. She curls up on her bed, wraps herself up in a blanket, and puts on _Mulan_. Picks at her pizza. Remembers Allison telling her how much she loved this film, how much she associated with Mulan. Laughs a little at some of the parallels she draws, cries a lot at most of them. Mulan cuts her hair, and Lydia is sobbing, can’t stop, can’t breathe.

Maybe she’ll cry herself out. 

Maybe she’ll dissolve. 

Maybe she’ll wake up soon. 

(She’d like to wake up, please.)

Thinks of all the sleepovers they’ll never have again, the movie nights. The whispered confessions made when it’s dark, trivial things, but at night all confessions come out hushed. Allison’s expression when she’d admitted she was top of the year, admitted her interest in fluid  mechanics,  and her determination to solve the Navier-Stokes Millenium Prize Problem. It wasn’t disbelief, or shock, or dismissal. It was awe, she thinks now, fond even as she shudders through her tears. Allison had been impressed, had respected Lydia’s talents and interests just as Lydia had respected hers. 

She had spent sixteen years yearning for respect, for that kind of bond. She’s young still, she knows that, but the thing is. The thing is. Can she have that kind of bond after Allison? She’s capable, sure, but could she ever forgive herself if she so much as tried? Allison’s her best friend, even now. Her _best friend_. 

The world is a lonely place.

 

\---

 

She falls asleep at some point, tangled up into her blankets, tear tracks slowly drying, pizza mainly untouched on her bedside table. She wakes at around 10pm, as her mother wraps her into a hug. It’s so early, somehow. Still so early.  

“Oh my baby, oh my darling,” croons her mother, “I only just heard, I’m so sorry I wasn’t here, oh Lydia, _Lydia_.”

It’s been years since she’s given in, years since she’s let either of her parents in without making them fight tooth and nail for it, but she gave herself tonight. She crumples. 

Her mom holds her until her breathing evens out, stops hitching with fresh tears. Lydia sits there, unable to think, her mind the most blessedly blank since this whole ordeal began, since last autumn. 

Her face is washed, she is given a bowl of ice cream, and her mom curls up beside her as they settle in to watch _Sleeping Beauty_. It was always Lydia’s favourite as a child, something they used to watch together before things got bad. Her mom hums along to the songs in her ear, and Lydia lets it all wash over her. Purify her. 

 

\---

 

If it weren’t the weekend, she doesn’t know what she’d do, but it is.

She showers in the morning, puts the temperature up so high that her skin is red and aching by the time she gets out. Puts on the softest, most comforting clothes she can find: an old band tee which Daphne left behind, a hoodie which used to be Jackson’s, and a pair of leggings. Strips her bed to wash the sheets. Asks for a lift to the vet’s. She really is going to have to get insured on a car of her own, soon. 

Deaton’s in the front room, halfway through trimming the claws of a mangy looking cat. He gives her a painfully soft smile, one that hits hard. Lydia can’t really afford to have people being too nice to her right now, not unless she’s willing to start crying again. And if she cries again, there’s a strong chance she’ll never really stop. She's definitely not willing.

“So,” says Deaton, and Lydia has to interrupt before he can continue. 

“Try to talk to me about the other night,” she instructs him, “And I will be forced to enact some sort of horrifying revenge.” It’s a pleasant, polite, and wholly terrifying tone of voice she’s long since perfected, but somehow doesn't have its usual force. 

Deaton smiles it off. “So,” he continues, “Prada is in the kennels in the other room, and should be perfectly fine to go home.”

“Right,” smiles Lydia. It doesn’t feel too fake. Less fake than pretty much all other emotions at the moment. 

She goes into the backroom, sudden urgency in her steps as she goes to Prada’s cage. By the time she has it open, she’s almost frantic. Prada jumps straight out the cage and into her arms, licking her face enthusiastically and Lydia’s so- She missed this. Missed her little dog. 

It feels kind of silly, but she cuddles Prada to her, and feels a little better as she sinks her face into his fur. He still loves her, which should be obvious but. But the whole world’s changed, and it changed so _fast_. This constant, this unending adoration, this loyal, stupid little dog, it settles her. 

Deaton walks into the backroom, some time later. Lydia’s sitting on the floor, oblivious to the fur and dust, hugging Prada to her tightly. The cage door still hangs open. 

She accepts his hand up, thanks him for taking care of her dog, walks back outside with Prada still clutched to her.

Now, who to call?

 

\---

 

The phone rings and rings and rings. Maybe she should give up, maybe she should call someone else. This was a bad idea, this was such a bad fucking– 

“Yeah, yeah, one sec, I just,” and there are mutters in the background which are clearly someone else responding. This was a bad idea. This was– “Wait, jesus, _Lydia?_ ”

“Hey Daphne,” says Lydia, hoping it’s been long enough that her sister can’t recognise the fragility in her voice.

“What the fuck,” says Daphne, “Are you okay?” 

“I’m fine,” says Lydia, alone in the woods with Prada, voice cracked with a hairline fracture, “Why wouldn’t I be okay?”

“Because you _called me_ ,” points out Daphne, and the noise in the background dims, a door slams, a lock clicks. “Right, hey, what’s going on? _Are you okay?_ ”

Lydia laughs a little, because she honestly didn’t expect this response, and her laughter sounds like something breaking. 

“ _Jesus_ ,” hisses Daphne, quietly enough that Lydia probably wasn’t supposed to hear it.

“Tell me about Juilliard,” commands Lydia, because Daphne was always a story-teller, and Lydia’s not above the escapism of stories. 

Daphne sighs quietly, aware of what Lydia means, of what she’s asking for. They haven’t talked in over two years now, haven’t seen each other in longer, but Daphne had always been good at reading between the lines. 

“What do you want to hear?” she asks. 

“Everything,” says Lydia. 

 

\---

 

She walks home through the woods, Prada running around her in circles, Daphne telling her silly anecdotes about friends she’ll likely never meet. She picks her way over branches, watches carefully for bear traps, absorbs the stories like they’re a lifeline. 

That way to the nemeton, and that way to the Hale house.

Here’s where she stepped on a bear trap. 

Here’s where Coach Finstock was shot.

Here’s where they found one of the human sacrifices.

Here's where she followed a young Peter Hale through the mist.

Maybe she’s passed where Scott was bitten? She has no way of knowing, but she wouldn’t be surprised. Everything in this goddamn _fucking_ town is interlinked. It’s all one giant tangle of thread, all these lives entwined and all these deaths. It’s a labyrinth, and she can’t escape, she doesn’t know the way out, and she’s going to be stuck here forever, trapped.

“How did you get out?” she demands suddenly, panic clawing in her throat, cutting over a story about a drunken night out and violet hair. “How did you– _How?_ ” Her voice is harsh, throat rough from tears, from fear. 

“ _Lyds_ ,” says Daphne, voice low and soothing, its purposeful calm nearly eclipsing the harsh edge of worry that’s slipped in. “Talk to me, Lyds, tell me what’s happened. C’mon, sis, what’s going on?” 

She gave up on Daphne as a sister over five years ago now. She’d never really had her as a sister, it felt like. They were so different, lived such different lives. Daphne had always been popular, cool, arty. Cared more for humanities, despite being nearly as good at mathematics as Lydia. Popular in a careless, dangerous, free kind of way which Lydia had always envied. Cool not for following conventions, but for dismissing them, for refusing to follow the stereotypical small town politics of Beacon Hills. Arty and individual, and had always had everything Lydia had ever wanted with minimal effort. Able to have her cake and eat it, able to do whatever she wanted without having to put on a front at any point. Always slightly disappointed in Lydia for being so conventional, for succumbing to the tropes of high school. 

It didn’t help when their parents argued. Daphne just lay around upstairs with her headphones in. Ignored Lydia’s existence, scorned the way she’d to get their attention. Eventually Lydia hadn’t been able to stand the casual dismissal, the sense of worthlessness, and had ignored Daphne in turn, pretended she couldn’t care less about failing Daphne’s impossibly high standards. So young and so bitter, she’d wanted revenge for her own invisibility. 

But then their parents divorced, and Daphne up and left, and it stayed unresolved. It was maybe even worse. They talked on the phone at Christmas once or twice, but only at the urging of an anxious parent, and by this point Lydia was too headstrong, too angry. Daphne had tried to mend things a couple of times, but she had _left_. She had just left Lydia, young and scared and alone in a big empty house, arguments echoing around the walls. Left her to parents who had ceased to see her as a child, but as a possession. Left her to this hellhole of a town. It wasn’t an easy thing to forgive. It wasn’t something Lydia was sure she wanted to forgive. 

Allison had changed everything. Allison who had been more of a sister to her in a few months than Daphne had bothered with in years. Allison who taught her the meaning of family, in all truth. Allison who would never smile at her again, never wrap an arm around her shoulder with a laugh, never tease her or plait her hair for her or whisper bitchy commentary about the people they passed in French or anything. Never again. Not anything.

“It’s been a really long year,” says Lydia, and thinks that now is the time for forgiveness. 

 

\---

 

It’s school tomorrow. How many times does something horrifying, something traumatising, something haunting have to happen in the school before she can’t go back, wonders Lydia. One day it’s going to trigger something, one day it’ll be one time too many, and she won’t be able to walk back in the doors. 

Hopefully she can graduate before it gets to that point. 

It’s school tomorrow, and she was going to finish her chemistry homework but she’s realised she doesn’t actually have her textbook. It’s at Allison’s apartment, stacked on the floor at the end of the bed from their last study session. 

She steels herself. She heads over to the Argents’. Argent’s. 

 

\---

 

“Chris?” she calls, knocking on the door again. She’s been here a couple of minutes, and there’s no answer. He’s not dead (she’d be able to tell) but he might be out. It’s not really an acceptable option. She really needs her textbook. 

She knocks again, rapid like gunfire, and hears swearing and stumbling. When the door opens, Chris Argent sways slightly. His eyes are red rimmed, and he smells of spirits from here. The apartment is dark, all the curtains shut, and the bitter scent of misery is a physical presence. 

Lydia thinks of Allison, thinks of how much this would hurt her. 

“Hey,” she says, softly. She’s been being looked after, and Scott and Isaac will have had each other and Melissa, and Stiles has his father, and she should have thought of this. She should have been more careful. 

“Lydia,” he greets, and his eyes are empty. 

She gives him a quick hug, moving away before he stops being surprised, wipes at her eyes, and gets to work. She leaves him the bottle of bourbon he’s halfway through, but bags up all the other alcohol bottles in the apartment. Opens first the curtains, then the windows. Unloads the dishwasher, and reloads it with dirty plates. Tidies away the papers and maps strewn about the place, recycling what she can and folding away everything else. Chris sits on the sofa in silence, eyes slowly adjusting, waking out of the stupor he’s been hiding in. She puts a glass of water next to him. Puts away what weapons she can.  

There’s no more delaying to do. 

She takes a deep breath.  

She opens the door to Allison’s room.

It still smells like her, and Lydia thinks this might be how it feels to be shot. She keeps walking in. It’s a mess, quite frankly; bed still crumpled, clothes and weapons scattered across the floor. In the middle of her desk is a picture of them, of Lydia and Allison laughing together. It’s not it’s usual place, it used to be pinned up to the wall by her bed. 

Lydia wishes she didn’t know just how frantic Allison had been to find her, wishes she’d just stayed home, wishes wishes wishes. She picks up the photo. It’s one Danny had taken, that day he’d gotten his old polaroid camera working. They’d all gone to a diner, Lydia and Allison and Jackson and Danny, Greenberg and Ivy and Hannah, and half the swim team. It was back before they really hung out with Scott or Stiles, before Peter Hale had ruined Lydia’s mind and body and friendships, and they look so _young_. They look so happy.

It was a reminder of Lydia for Allison, it’s a reminder of Allison for Lydia.

She slips it into her chemistry textbook, can’t risk it crumpling. She doesn’t really want to touch anything, wants to leave it all like this, but it’s the sort of mess Allison would have hated. She makes the bed, folds the clothes away, tidies up the desk. Finds five different pieces of clothing she hadn’t realised Allison had, and two more textbooks. Finds a folder of embarrassing poetry from back when Allison was thirteen, living in San Francisco, and terrible at rhyming. Chris moves into the threshold, shoulders high and tight like he doesn’t know if he can walk in. 

Lydia starts reading. 

“ _Of all the places that I’ve been,_

_ None are home like San Francisco,  _

_ No matter the cities that I’ve seen, _

_It’s only San Fran I love so!_ ”

Chris laughs a little, and Lydia smiles with him, and if they’re both a bit watery around the edges, neither of them is going to mention it. She keeps reading out Allison’s old poems, and eventually he walks in, sits on the bed beside her, reads out a sonnet about parks, a limerick about a boy in her class called Chad.

Lydia knows she should have been looking after him for Allison, won’t slip up again. She’ll offer to help plan the funeral, but later. For now they sit side by side and smile fondly at the poems Allison had been excruciatingly embarrassed of, but refused to leave behind when they moved.

**Author's Note:**

> I know this isn't finished, but as this is wholly self-indulgent, I don't know how long it is going to be. 
> 
> Feel free to bother me over at [islandoforder](http://www.islandoforder.tumblr.com)!


End file.
